Thursday, August 11, 2011

It’s hard to write this article because of the flood impact on our area, which places President Obama’s joy in finding the missing apostrophe in his “Irish” name, at the ‘teeney-bopper’ level it really is. With all the “media” coverage of the “freedom fighters” in the Near East countries, risking their lives for “democracy,” I wish to take a simple look at this concept of a “Dictatorship of the Majority” versus a Constitutional Republic which protects the freedom and rights of a simple minority of one individual against the sheer weight and power of a numerical majority of one single individual. This comparison is an eons old problem, and will exist as long as humans are humans, BECAUSE, as George Orwell so simply stated it in 1984, “The ultimate power is the power over people.”

Suppose, for example, an election of 100 million voters. Would a majority of 50,000,001, which is really only a majority of ONE-- {1} dictate over a minority of 49,999,999? If that is the case, why do they even mention EQUALITY? So, if that one vote gives ALL power to the group with “ONE” more voter, then what should the 49,999,999 do? Give up? Compromise? Or should they strengthen their “loyal opposition”?

First, why did Nikolai Lenin believe that a “A Dictatorship of the Proletariat” would be superior to a “Dictatorship of the Bourgeosie?” Because he understood exactly what he had in mind for his “exploiters” of the economic system. I quote from Lenin: “First of all, this argument is used with certain interpretations of “democracy in general” and “dictatorship in general” without raising the point as to which class one has in mind.” WHY? Later Lenin says; “History teaches us that no oppressed class has ever come into power and cannot come into power, without passing through a period of dictatorship, that is, the conquest of power and the forcible suppression of the most desperate and mad resistance which does not hesitate to resort to ANY crimes, such has always been shown by the exploiters.” And later, Lenin says, “The capitalists have always called ‘freedom’ the freedom to make money for the rich, and freedom to die of hunger for workmen.

The capitalists call “freedom” the freedom of the rich, freedom to buy up the press, to use wealth, to manufacture and support so-called public opinion. The defenders of “pure democracy” again in actual fact turn out to be the defenders of the most dirty and corrupt system of the rule of the rich over the means of education of the masses. They deceive the people by attractive, fine-sounding, beautiful but absolutely false phrases, trying to dissuade the masses from the concrete historic task of freeing the press from the capitalists who have gotten control of it.

Actual freedom and equality will exist only in the order established by the Communists, in which it will be impossible to become rich at the expense of another; where it will be impossible either directly or indirectly to subject the press to the power of money; where there will be no obstacle to prevent any toiler from enjoying and actually realizing the equal right to the use public printing presses and of the public fund of paper.”

Dictatorship of the proletariat resembles dictatorship of other classes in that it was called forth by the need to suppress the forcible resistance of a class that was losing its political leadership. But that which definitely distinguishes a dictatorship of the proletariat from a dictatorship of other classes, from a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie in all the civilized capitalist countries, is that the dictatorship of the landlords and the bourgeoisie was the forcible suppression of the resistance of the overwhelming majority of the population, namely the toilers. On the other hand, the dictatorship of the proletariat is the forcible suppression of the resistance of the exploiters, that is, of an insignificant minority of the population—of landlords and capitalists.It therefore follows that a dictatorship of the proletariat must necessarily carry with it not only changes in the form and the institutions of democracy, speaking in general terms, but specifically such a change as would secure an extension such as has never been seen in the history of the world of the actual use of democratism by the toiling classes.”[Speech by Nikolai Lenin, given before the Communist National Congress in 1919. The World’s Great Speeches; page 141.]

From The World’s Great Speeches, President Herbert Hoover in his September 17, 1935 speech “The Bill of Rights” stated: “Today the Constitution is indeed under more vivid discussion than at any time since the years before the Civil War…The aroused interest of today is again the rights of man. Today, the issue is the rights of the individual in relation to the government. This too involves the fate of the nation…If for no other reason, this discussion has been forced upon us because new philosophies and new theories of government which have arisen in the world which militantly deny the validity of our principles.” “New” philosophies? “New” theories of government?

Hoover says: “These rights---to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, free speech and press, freedom of worship, peaceable assembly, equality before thelaw, freedom from unreasonable search---were no sudden discovery, no over-night inspiration. They were established by centuries of struggle in which men died fighting bitterly for their recognition. Their beginnings lie in the Magna Charta at Runnymede five hundred and seventy years before the Constitution was written. Down through the centuries the Habeas Corpus, the Petition of Rights, the Declaration of Rights, the growth of the fundamental maxims of the Common Law, marked their expansion and security.”

“Those who proclaim that by the Machine Age there is created an irreconcilable conflict in which Liberty must be sacrificed should not forget the battles for these rights over the centuries, for let it be remembered that in the end these are UNDYING PRINCIPLES which spring FROM THE SOULS OF MEN.” Hoover also, in 1935, said, “Nor do I admit that sacrifice of these rights would add to economic efficiency or would gain in economic security, or would find a single job or would give a single assurance in old age. The dynamic forces, which sustain economic security and progress in human comfort, lie deep below the surface. They reach to those human impulses, which are watered alone by freedom. The initiative of men, their enterprise, the inspiration of thought, flower in full only in the security of these rights.” He also states “Liberty comes alone(only) and lives only(alone) where the hard-won rights of men are held inalienable, where governments themselves may not infringe, where governments are indeed but the mechanisms TO Protect and SUSTAIN THESE PRINCIPLES.”

Today all we hear from the CEO of the United States, Obama, is that the majority and minority should arrive at a “compromise.” If so, why have an election? Wendell L. Willkie, in his November 11, 1940 speech, shortly after having lost the election to FDR, said: “ It is a fundamental principle of the democratic system that the majority rules. The function of the minority, however, is equally fundamental. It is about the function of that minority—22,000,000 people, nearly half of our electorate, that I wish to talk to you tonight.” He goes on to compare our Senate and House with the British system of the House of Commons and the House of Lords, where all of the government’s policies are freely debated. In Britain some opposition party leaders are members of the government and some say that a similar device should be adopted here. That is a false conception of our government…This is because the British Cabinet is a committee of the Houses of Parliament. It is a committee of equals, wherein the Prime Minister is chairman, a lofty chairman, indeed, and yet a chairman. The other members are his colleagues.

With us the situation as you well know is different. Our executive branch is NOT a committee of our legislative branch.(at least not before FDR attempted to control everything through executive orders, and Obama has threatened and intimidated our legislative branches)Our President is independent of our CONGRESS. {and, like-wise, our Congress is independent of him} The members of the President’s Cabinet are NOT his colleagues. They are his administrative subordinates. They are subject to his orders.

An American President could fill his whole Cabinet with leaders of the opposition party and still our Administration would not be a two-party administration. It would be an administration of a majority President giving orders to minority representatives of his own choosing. These representatives must concur in the President’s convictions. If they do not, they have no alternative except to resign.”

“We, who stand ready to serve our country behind our Commander in Chief, nevertheless retain the right and I will say the duty, to debate the course of our government. Ours is a two-party system. Should we ever permit one party to dominate our lives{notice Wilkie says ‘lives’, not ‘politics’} entirely, democracy would collapse and we would have DICTATORSHIP.”

Finally, what in fact is the primary function of the Office of the President? From where does it get the power? Power to do what? From where does the vision of what WE the people want come? 35,000 innocent Mexicans have been slaughtered in Mexico by murdering squads of drug cartels since their President cracked down on the drug traffic. When will Obama order troops down there? Why has he not done it already, since he is interfering everywhere else in the name of “birthing democracies”? Study a little history, my friends, while you still have the time and the FREEDOM to do so. Like Orwell said in Animal farm, ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL---which after the “utopian change” became mysteriously changed, in fact one might even say miraculously changed, to: BUT SOME ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS!” Read and learn! Remember, when the producer’s incentive to produce is destroyed through excessive government intervention, regulations, and taxation; the consumers have only one option left; to consume each other; because while it is possible to “subsidize and mandate” the production of food stamps, even Michelle Obama has not developed a way to give them nutritional value. It would be, however, the crowning climax of her campaign to starve out obesity, but only if they go easy on the Irish “beer.”

Citizen of ND since 1953, Ruben has BS and BA degrees from Dickinson State University, MA in English from University of Kansas, and was a Mandan High School teacher for 20 years, College faculty member at Dickinson State, Bismarck State, and the University of Mary. Married to wife Lois since 1958 with 5 children.